From: duperval@ERE.UMontreal.CA (Duperval Laurent) Subject: Index of ftp sites Date: 16 Jul 1992 14:28:38 GMT
Hi there,
Last night I was browsing through the various ftp sites, going through the
sources, binaries, incoming, etc., directories. I was looking for very
specific stuff, mainly the sources to different parts of the Linux binaries in
/bin (ls, mv, cp, etc.) and other utilities that might help me get a better
system going. But, while there are GB's of programs and sources available, I
have ABSOLUTELY no idea what most of those programs do (for example, what is
vile? Sounds pretty nasty to me...).
After going through a lot of archive sites (ftp.ulowell.edu, simtel & oak,
garbo, etc), I kinda got used to having an index file in each directory,
saying what the different files were and what was contained in them.
I know this is burdening ftp site operators but... is it possible to maintain
some kind of index that could be ftp'ed so we, the people, can decide what
files might be useful, without having to download 1.2 MB of data,
uncompressing, untaring, reading the README... and then finding out "Hey! I
don't need this at all." ?
Just a thought.
-- Laurent Duperval duperval@ere.umontreal.ca duperval@jsp.umontreal.ca